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 Editorials | Issues | September 2007 
Leftist Rebels Say They Bombed Mexico Pipelines
 Reuters
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| | A Mexican soldier looks at a fire caused by an explosion at a gas pipeline belonging to state oil monopoly Pemex near Maltrata in the eastern Mexican state of Veracruz. (Imelda Medina/Reuters) |
Mexico City - A leftist rebel group, the Popular Revolutionary Army, said it bombed Mexican oil and gas pipelines this week in the second such attack in two months, Mexican media said on Tuesday.
Known by their Spanish initials EPR, the guerrillas left a written message at a pipeline in the state of Veracruz beside a bomb that failed to explode, El Universal newspaper said.
Explosions at six pipelines on Monday disrupted oil and gas supplies, forced thousands from their homes and caused hundreds of millions of dollars in damage to state oil monopoly Pemex. No one was injured.
Mexico is a major exporter of crude to the United States but its six refineries were operating as normal and exports of oil, gas and fuel products were not affected, Pemex said.
The small rebel group wrote a message referring to what it says was the abduction and disappearance of sympathizers by security forces. It signed the message with the initials
"EPR."
"I am able to confirm the message," the Reforma daily quoted Veracruz Gov. Fidel Herrera as saying.
In July, the EPR set off a wave of bomb attacks on energy pipelines that cut natural gas supplies to thousands of businesses. But Monday's bombings - most of which were in the eastern state of Veracruz, on the Gulf of Mexico - were on a larger scale.
The EPR emerged in the 1990s and has been active mostly in the poor states of Guerrero, Michoacan, Oaxaca and Chiapas.
Mexico has deployed soldiers and federal police to protect pipelines but President Felipe Calderon has acknowledged it is almost impossible to completely secure the vast network.
The guerrilla group had been quiet in recent years but stepped up attacks after security forces cracked down on anti-governor protests in the state of Oaxaca in 2006.
It set off a bomb at a Sears department store in Oaxaca in August and attacked a jail under construction in the southern state of Chiapas. |
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